September 28, 2016

Bottomless bullshit

An adviser to Donald Trump on Tuesday offered a new explanation for why a portrait of Trump — paid for by the Republican nominee's charitable foundation — wound up on display at a Trump-owned golf resort in Florida.

Trump, the adviser said, was actually doing his charity a favor, by "storing" its painting on the wall of a bar at Trump National Doral, outside Miami.

"There are IRS rules which specifically state that when a foundation has an item, an individual can store those items — on behalf of the foundation — in order to help it with storage costs," Trump adviser Boris Epshteyn said on MSNBC….

Tax experts were not impressed by this reasoning.

"It's hard to make an IRS auditor laugh," Brett Kappel, a lawyer who advises nonprofit groups at the Akerman firm, said in an email. "But this would do it."

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An adviser to Donald Trump on Tuesday offered a new explanation for why a portrait of Trump — paid for by the Republican nominee's charitable foundation — wound up on display at a Trump-owned golf resort in Florida.

Trump, the adviser said, was actually doing his charity a favor, by "storing" its painting on the wall of a bar at Trump National Doral, outside Miami.

"There are IRS rules which specifically state that when a foundation has an item, an individual can store those items — on behalf of the foundation — in order to help it with storage costs," Trump adviser Boris Epshteyn said on MSNBC….

Tax experts were not impressed by this reasoning.

"It's hard to make an IRS auditor laugh," Brett Kappel, a lawyer who advises nonprofit groups at the Akerman firm, said in an email. "But this would do it."